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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/23534125">The First of April</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonymousCapybara/pseuds/AnonymousCapybara'>AnonymousCapybara</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Canonical Character Death, F/M, Slice of Life</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-04-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-04-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-01 16:02:05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,215</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/23534125</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonymousCapybara/pseuds/AnonymousCapybara</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Everything is as it should be. Everything is as it was yesterday, even. But that does not stop the aching in Ginny’s chest. Sighing, she pulls the calendar off of the pin on which it hangs on the kitchen wall and switches it from March to April.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Harry Potter/Ginny Weasley</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>17</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The First of April</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Ginny stands alone in her kitchen, the early morning light beginning to seep through the window. It is a lovely spring day. Her husband is banging around in his study, probably gathering his things to go to the office. Her two sons are off at Hogwarts, and her daughter Lily is upstairs, still presumably asleep in her bed.</p><p>Everything is as it should be. Everything is as it was yesterday, even. But that does not stop the aching in Ginny’s chest. Sighing, she pulls the calendar off of the pin on which it hangs on the kitchen wall and switches it from March to April.</p><p>At Lily’s insistence (and Ginny was quickly learning how hard it was to say no to an insistent ten-year-old girl), the Potters had a calendar of baby animals hanging on the wall in their kitchen. Lily loved nothing more than to come downstairs at the start of every month and rave about the animals on the calendar page. Each month, she proclaimed that they were the cutest ever and begged to have one as a pet. </p><p>In March, it had been piglets. This month, apparently, it will puppies.</p><p>On the calendar page, two reddish-colored golden retriever puppies were frolicking around together. They kept stumbling into each other and tumbling onto the ground, their tails wagging happily the whole time. A matching set, Ginny thinks bitterly. </p><p>And on today of all days, this brought thoughts of another matching set, who had once seemed as careless and joyful as those puppies romping about on the calendar.</p><p>Ginny brushes her thumb absently over today’s date: 1 April. It used to seem so fitting that the twins were born on April Fools' Day. Their lives were so full of joy and jokes and pranks. Now, their birthday being on such a lighthearted holiday seems like the biggest joke of them all.</p><p>Hot tears well up in Ginny’s eyes, and before she can help it, before she even has time to process them, they are creating hot streaks down her cheeks. But no, this sadness is not what she wants to feel when she thinks of her brother. Putting two steadying hands on the counter, Ginny steels herself. </p><p>She jumps, however, when she feels a light hand on her shoulder, knowing without turning around that it will be Harry. Harry who, despite all of their best efforts, has never quite stopped blaming himself for the battle and for all of the lives that were lost. Not wanting to encourage his guilt, Ginny quickly swipes her face with the back of her hand and turns around with a small smile.</p><p>“I was just crying over the puppies?” she tries weakly, but a look into her husband’s eyes shows what she already knew. He, of course, already knows what she is feeling.</p><p>“Of course you were,” he smiles warmly, but the light doesn’t quite reach his eyes. Today is hard on them all.</p><p>Later, Ginny knows that she will have to floo over to George and Angelina’s. George, of course, will not be there. No one has seen him on his birthday these last nineteen years. Where he disappears off to, no one knows. No one dares to ask, either.</p><p>She and Angie will drink tea and reminisce. Visitors will pop in throughout the day, Ron and Hermione, Percy, and of course a conglomeration of other Weasleys. Her mother will pop in with far too many baked goods for just George and Angie to eat now that the kids are away at school. She will leave two small, decorated cakes out on the table. No one ever comments on the fact that she still makes two cakes.</p><p>But all of that will happen a few hours from now, and Ginny needs to spend these next few hours honoring her brother in her own way.</p><p>“You know,” Harry says from the table, with what appears to be half of a scone in his mouth, “He was a really good man.”</p><p>Ginny’s eyes gleam with hot tears again, but this time she is able to repress them. </p><p>“Oh, come off it,” she scoffs at her husband. “Sure, he died way too young and it was tragic and horrible and so unfair, but let’s not glamourize him. I can absolutely guarantee you that is my brother were alive right now, I would be threatening to kill him right now for whatever prank he had decided to pull on me.” </p><p>And how unfair it is that I’m not getting that opportunity, she adds bitterly in her head.</p><p>Harry chuckles at that. “I’ll give you that. He certainly would want us to remember him for the laughs he brought us, not the tears.”</p><p>“And that,” Ginny says with a gleam in her eye, “is why I have decided that this year, I will honor Fred in the best way that I know. Through pranks.”</p><p>Harry looks apprehensive. “Should I be worried?” he asks, closely examining the scone he was eating.</p><p>Ginny looks at him innocently. “Oh… I’m sure you and Lily have nothing to worry about here.” (Something in her tone leads Harry to not believe her.)</p><p>“Our other children, however… well, James will be receiving a howler at breakfast. I just keep imagining him opening it in the Great Hall – you know, like Ron in my first year.” She giggles at the memory. James was quite a bit like his Uncle Ron.</p><p>“And Al?” Harry asked.</p><p>“Not a howler for Al,” she said. “Poor thing has had a hard enough time adjusting to being a Slytherin. Wouldn’t want to publicly embarrass him. Although Rosie has agreed to charm his robes to change colour throughout the day.”</p><p>“Good girl, that Rosie.” Ginny nods in agreement. </p><p>It’s a small step forward, she thinks, pranking her children on April Fools' Day. But, after years of avoiding the holiday, she knows it is the right step. She knows that it is exactly what Fred would want them to be doing in remembrance of him.</p><p>Far away, in the Hogwarts Great Hall, Fred Weasley (the second) is having such a laugh at his cousin James’s misfortune in receiving a howler from his mum that his pumpkin juice is coming out of his nose.</p><p>And later, Al is leaving Herbology in bubblegum pink robes (earlier, they were purple, and he can’t figure out how to change them back). Rosie and Scorpius are following closely behind him, giggling (but also trying to act like they’re not friends, because they’re definitely not, okay?).</p><p>And little by little, the world is becoming a happier place, less touched by Voldemort. Sure, those who were alive for the battle will never forget, but almost two decades later, they are beginning to put it behind them.</p><p>And for the first time in many years, George is not spending his birthday wallowing. Well okay, maybe he’s doing a little wallowing, but he’s also hard at work in the Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes offices.</p><p>The shop is closed today, as it has been every first of April for the last nineteen years, out of respect for Fred. But maybe, George thinks, just maybe, the shop should be open on his birthday next year. Who is he to deny the world of jokes on Fred Weasley’s birthday?</p>
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